call me maybe
by Canadino
Summary: Hey I just met you. Tsunami/Tachimukai


**Disclaimer: The only thing I own is the story idea and only some of the witty remarks. I own so little; so please don't steal.**

Background music: CALL ME MAYBE – CARLY RAE JEPSON

[=]

It became evident very early on during the beginnings of the Football Frontier Internationals that, due to the larger team and the team's members' diverse and scattered hobbies and personalities, contact information was going to need to be exchanged. The managers did their best to collect and compose a master list of numbers and email addresses that was to be posted both in the interior of the team bus and inside their lodgings. "You all should exchange numbers between yourselves, too," Aki said wisely, as she scribbled down all the numbers. "That way, if some of you have to reach each other but aren't near the bus or the lodge, you can find the others easier."

Only some of Inazuma Japan's members had cell phones, but they were all part of different groups of two or three boys that rarely were seen away from each other. Endou did not have a phone, but insisted that should anyone need him, they only had to announce the intention of playing soccer and he would come running. Kidou had pulled out a sleek phone and went around business-like collecting numbers. Tsunami did not quite see the need for him to share his number, as he had already lost many phones to the sea, but shared and made a secret promise to stop bringing his phone with him to the beach. In the middle of exchanging information with Kazemaru, Tachimukai came up to him, red-faced, and thrust a scrap of paper at him.

"C-call me…maybe!" he squeaked, before running off. Tsunami looked down at the digits on the scrap of paper as Kazemaru pretended he had not seen; Tachimukai would have easily pulled him aside to switch phones, and the paper did not have anything else written on it.

"What do you think he meant by that?" he asked Endou, who seemed to be the middleman for everyone on the team. Endou only gave him an oblivious grin and said that Tachimukai obviously wanted Tsunami to call him, because wasn't the intention pretty clear? If Endou did not see anything further in that, Tsunami doubted the rest of the team would; Kidou would probably give him an unnecessarily complicated lecture and the managers had a knack of sharing any information they received with the rest of the team and Tsunami did not want to embarrass Tachimukai any more – the goalkeeper had not properly looked him in the eye since.

Rika had asked Tsunami one if he was interested in Touko in any way, to which he sputtered that they were just teammates. In reality, he and Touko had silently acknowledged each other as worthy rivals and by extension, bros. Tsunami had been the first she had called after Rika took post at her house and he had given her the idea of the laugh track to counter all of Rika's dry jokes (at least, until Rika caught on that Touko did not mean her laughter – and then it got harder). So Tsunami called her out for a chat (all the while Rika on Touko's end of the line going, "Hot date, hot date!") and Touko was very informative.

"You see it in shoujo mangas all the time," she said smartly, as Tsunami felt himself being initiated into a very secretive part of girlhood. "It's a subtle plea for you to realize his feelings for you."

"Tachimukai doesn't like me like that-"

"_Doesn't he_?" Touko said fiercely so there was no argument. "I know about these things," she continued, as Tsunami turned away to compose himself again. "He's been making eyes at you since you joined the team. I know. And this was his chance for him to make a move on you."

Tsunami doubted her, but he had been at the receiving end of The Tower once too many times and quickly agreed with her as she asked him to confirm her theories. That would have been that, until Touko asked him about his counterattack and non-consensually offered her ideas when he replied he did not have any.

The next time Tsunami went surfing, he followed Touko's advice ("You'll do it, right? _Right_?") and went to see Tachimukai's goalie practices afterwards. The first year had tripped over his feet at the sight of him and sputtered incoherently as Tsunami helped him to his feet. They chatted rather innocently, although Tsunami noticed Tachimukai often glanced longingly at his phone and became flustered when Tsunami asked if he was waiting for a call.

"Stupid!" Touko shouted over the phone when he called her to consult. "Of course he was! Yours!"

"Should I call him now, then?" Tsunami asked. She deafened him with a loud _no_ and gave nonsensical reasons about how feelings were delicate and were to be handled gently, but the situation seemed pretty straightforward to Tsunami. He listened to be polite and ignored her by dialing Tachimukai after they hung up.

The dial tone ran twice before there was a nervous, _hello_? on the other end.

"Hey," Tsunami said. "I just met you, and this is crazy, but…"

There was a frantic sputter before Tachimukai hung up.

[=]

Note: I started this way back in April but I stopped it to write other fics and finally as I was looking for busy work on my laptop at work, I found this and slapped a cheesy ending. No hate about Carly Rae Jepson, Call Me Maybe is music of the gods.


End file.
